← From Our Own Correspondent
From Our Own Correspondent
Opting to go lower caste
00:28:10
Downgrading your caste to get privileges in India.
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Kate Adie
Thank you for downloading the latest edition
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BBC Presenter
of BBC Radio's from our own correspondent,
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Kate Adie
the best in news and current affairs storytelling.
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Olagarin
It's introduced by Kate Ady.
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BBC Presenter
Hello. Today, why some high caste Indians now want to be reclassified as low caste. A used field marshal for sale in Egypt. Yours for £70,000. Egyptians take their autocratic president at his word and put him up on ebay. We're on the campaign trail in America, where Donald Trump has said he'd ban all Muslims from entering the country. So how did the encounter between the Trump supporter and the Muslim refugee go in Siberia? There's a definite chill in the air as the BBC finds itself at the receiving end of something less than a warm welcome and shrieks of delight. Balloons and banners. A few tears too. Welcome to the arrivals hall at Havana Airport. In India this week, some two thirds of the 16 million residents of Delhi found their water supply almost entirely cut off or reduced to a trickle, not because of drought or some other natural disaster, but because of a violent protest over affirmative action job quotas. At least 18 people were killed and hundreds injured. It was all because of caste, that ancient system of dividing Hindu society into a strict hierarchy, often based on occupation. Categories range from priests, warriors and false farmers to labourers. Those belonging to lower castes once had little chance of getting good jobs or a university education, so quotas were set up for them for work and study places. And now, as Sanjoy Majumda has been finding, others want a slice of that pie.
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Sanjoy Majumdar
Running out of water is not something people living in the capital of the world's largest democracy expected after a political Protestant. But the protesters from the Jat caste, an influential farming community, had seized and damaged a vital canal which is Delhi's main source of water. It caught everyone by surprise and also was a sharp illustration of the extent to which the community was willing to go to press its demands. Dajaats are spread across a number of north Indian states, but are a particularly powerful community in the state of Haryana, which surrounds Delhi, where they make up more than a quarter of the total population. Relatively affluent, the Jats are upper caste Hindus who have traditionally lived off the land. But now they're demanding that they be redesignated as lower caste Hindus in order to benefit from India's caste based affirmative action system. At the moment, low caste Hindus are guaranteed a percentage of government jobs in university places as an attempt to overcome centuries of discrimination and social disadvantage. At the bottom of the complex caste hierarchy are the Dalits, once known as the Untouchables. But other low caste communities and indigenous tribes are also allotted a share of jobs and study places. So why do the Jats want to slide down the caste ladder? It really boils down to economics, with a bit of politics thrown in. As you drive out of Delhi into Haryana State, it's hard to distinguish just where the city ends and the countryside begins. High rise apartment blocks emerge out of lush green fields. Many others are in various stages of construction. Highways are being widened and the land on each side is being redeveloped to build both residential properties as well as commercial ones, including factories. India is one of the world's fastest growing economies, an emerging Asian giant. Rapid industrialization and building the infrastructure to support it are the cornerstones of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's plan to make the country a manufacturing hub, rivalling China. But along the way, they are reshaping the countryside and the communities that live there. There is now less land available to the Jats to farm. Many of them have sold their land for handsome profits, but not necessarily invested the money wisely. We don't have a head for things like business and capital, one farmer told me, pulling on his long pipe. And despite India's economic success, the country still has not been able to generate enough jobs for its people. The private sector is estimated to only employ some 12% of India's workforce. And the slowdown in the global economy has not helped either. So for many Indians, the most secure form of employment is to land a government job. India's small towns are filled with advertisements for special coaching centres which train people to take the highly competitive civil service exam. Those who make it through are immediately assured of handsome dowries, administrative power and jobs for life. There's little doubt that India's policy of positive discrimination has led to greater social mobility for the lower castes. With economic and social improvement has come political influence. Political parties representing lower caste groups have a significant presence in the Indian Parliament and in a number of Indian states. That has created growing resentment in other communities, leading to demands for similar concessions. Demands that sometimes spill into outright violence. Last year, the 15 million strong Patel community in Prime Minister Modi's native Gujarat state held massive protests demanding its own quotas and government jobs, which have not yet been granted. A similar demand from the Kapus in southern Andhra Pradesh has left riots spreading across 13 districts. Like the Jats, the Kapus make up more than a quarter of their state's population. The Indian government has said it's willing to concede the demands of the Jats. The problem, many people fear, is that this will open the door to others who will take to the streets in the hope of an equally favourable outcome. Which would be disastrous for Mr. Modi, who was elected with a massive majority in 2014 on the back of a pledge to reform the Indian economy and deliver millions out of poverty. But he can't do it by simply giving everyone a government job.
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BBC Presenter
Sanjoy Majumda it's been a busy week for the Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah Al Sisi. He finally admitted that it was terrorists who downed the Russian passenger jet that crashed in the Sinai desert last year, and he asked all Egyptians to donate a pound every morning, an Egyptian pound towards tackling the country's debt problem. This came in his longest speech since being elected president in May 2014. It was rapidly derided on social media. Mr. Sisi, who originally seized power in a coup in 2013, once enjoyed widespread support. But as Olagueiran's been finding, the former military strongman is starting to look weaker.
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Olagarin
In a few hours on ebay, the ad attracted plenty of attention and bids of over £70,000. It's not every day you find a Middle Eastern leader on offer. After Egypt's president Abdel Fattah Al Sisi said he would sell himself for the sake of his country, someone decided to do it for him. They listed him as a used field marshal. The seller emphasized SEC's military background, but said he was of no value. Egypt's former army chief has marched himself into dangerous terrain. He's becoming a figure of fun. Political jokes are a symptom of discontent. Of course, it pays to be careful here when poking fun at the president, you can be jailed for that. A law student is serving three years for posting a picture online showing Sisi with Mickey Mouse ears. The ebay episode followed a lengthy televised address at 90 minutes, far too lengthy for many viewers. I was with a group of Egyptian journalists as they watched their president beg, plead, digress and bark orders. If you truly love your country, don't listen to anyone but me, he said. I am deadly serious. That sounds like Gaddafi's old script, one journalist said. No, it's like Morsi's last speech, said another, referring to a rambling address by the former Islamist president Mohamed Morsi. He gave it just before he was deposed by Sisi. When the current leader finally finished his speech, one reporter walked away shaking her head. It's the beginning of the end for him, she said. There is a growing sense here that trouble is brewing. The economy is struggling after years of turmoil. Prices are rising. Egyptians have been warned of more painful measures to come. My local chemist's is a good place to take the temperature. The balding be spectacled pharmacist dispenses political analysis of along with prescription drugs. All this in a shop not much wider than a corridor. He's been a staunch CC supporter as long as I've known him. Not anymore. Don't ask me about him, he practically shouted when I last saw him. At least under Morsi I could breathe, I could express an opinion. Under his successor, freedom has been sucked from Egyptian life like oxygen being drained from a closed room. Protests have been virtually banned, critics of the regime have been jailed in record numbers and enforced disappearances are on the rise. Every few months, hundreds more Egyptians are snatched from the streets. The tragic case of the Italian researcher Giulio Riggini attracted international headlines. He was open hearted and full of life, one of his Egyptian friends told me through tears. And he had lots of hopes and plans for a bright future. That was before the young academic was abducted, professionally tortured and dumped in a ditch. In today's Egypt, some are neither imprisoned nor free. Cairo Airport now serves two purposes. As one commentator has explained on Twitter, it's a place where you go to take a plane and find out if you're in trouble with the authorities. The renowned investigative journalist and human rights activist Hossam Bagat got his answer a few days ago when he tried to fly to Jordan. Rather ironically, he was heading to a United nations conference on justice in the Arab world. At the airport, he discovered he had been added to the no Fly list. When we met recently, the clean shaven, softly spoken campaigner sounded weary. If you look at the number of political prisoners and jailed journalists and the lack of room for peaceful opposition, things have never been worse, he said. What we have right now is an incompetent military dictator. The president still has his supporters, but they are less vocal than before. Anger at police brutality, which helped spark the revolution of 2011, is brewing once again. A police officer shot dead a minibus driver recently after a row about a fair. The officer was nearly lynched by locals who later converged on a security headquarters. Photos of the dead driver and the protest that followed spread rapidly on social media. The very next day, President Sisi promised tougher measures against police abuses. Look how quickly he reacted, an Egyptian colleague said. That shows he's nervous.
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BBC Presenter
And that was Olagarin. The campaign to secure the Republican and Democrat parties nominations for the American presidential elections is hotting up. Tuesday will be pivotal. The day they call Super Tuesday, when 11 states vote in primary elections and caucuses. Donald Trump's call for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States caused controversy around the world. Although it's popular with many conservative Americans, the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination says it's a matter of security. His critics argue it's a bigoted proposal that plays on voters prejudice. Rajini Varjanathan went for an unlikely brunch with a Donald Trump supporter, a Muslim refugee from Iraq, and the Alabama pastor who is trying to bridge the divide.
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Kate Adie
I like to build bridges, bridges of understanding, said Jim Mather as he welcomed me into his home in a suburb of Mobile, Alabama, in America's Deep South. As I entered his living room, my eyes darted around the walls decorated with artefacts from around the globe. An Indian flag hung in the centre behind a huge plasma screen tv. On another wall there was a framed map of the world. Jim is a Christian pastor who works with international students at the nearby university, helping them settle in when they first arrive to a new community, culture and country. We host our international dinners in here, he told me with a look of pride on his face. Our last one was Vietnamese and the food was wonderful. Jim had prepared brunch. His wife Mary handed me a steaming cup of chai as I was introduced to one of his friends, Steve. Steve Weller is 63 and retired. He met Jim several years ago after one of Jim's international students was attacked near a bar Steve used to run. It was an unlikely first meeting which led to a lasting friendship. Moments later the doorbell sounded as another guest for brunch arrived, 19 year old Mustafa Hummmies. Wearing a brown hoodie. He was slightly shy as he entered the room. Mustafa came to the United States in 2013. Originally from Iraq, he fled one war zone for another, moving first to Aleppo in Syria before eventually gaining refugee status in the us. He met Jim through the local refugee community as a regular at his get togethers and today he accepted Jim's invite for this rather unlikely meeting. Steve is a supporter of Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, who, like many in this conservative state of Alabama, agrees with the billionaire's controversial proposal to temporarily ban all Muslims from the United States. And yet there he was, sitting face to face across Jim's kitchen table, which was laden with bagels and other breakfast snacks from one of the very same people that policy might prevent from coming. In defence of Donald Trump, his statement wasn't to get rid of all refugees, he just wants to figure out what's going on, said Steve as the discussion began. I don't think he really wants to stop people like these folk, he said, flashing Mustafa a warm smile. But Donald Trump's policy would mean all Muslims would be stopped, albeit temporarily, in what many say is an outrageously discriminatory plan. That is extreme. But then there's radical Muslims who infiltrate, which could be a problem. Steve said in his lilting Southern accent. Unlike the sparring I'm used to seeing amongst Washington politicians, the discussion was civil and friendly. Steve's support for Trump is rooted in his own concerns for safety. He's worried that if refugees come into the country without being properly vetted, they could inflict harm on the us. But we are vetted properly, said Mustafa as he explained to Steve in great detail what he had to go through before he could enter the country. Reams of paperwork which catalogued his entire Life. Interviews with U.S. officials who repeatedly asked the same question about America, just to see what reaction they'd get. After all of that, why would anyone want to do harm to their new home? Mustafa said to Steve. We've come here for a better life. As the conversation continued in full flow, with Steve sipping on his coffee, Mustafa on his water, Steve's position seemed to soften. You're not the ones who need to be vetted. You're an example of a good refugee who needs to be welcomed, he said. But Steve didn't have an answer to the fact Mr. Trump's policy is a blanket ban, which would make no distinction between the teenager sitting opposite him and any other Muslim. As the conversation closed, it was clear that Steve felt torn. On one hand, he was happy for refugees like Mustafa to come to America, but he didn't know how to balance that with his concerns for safety and his fear of terror on home soil. Steve's chat with Mustafa was enlightening for both men. It showed that even with polarising views, it's possible to engage in dialogue. Steve learnt more than he'd known before about how tough it is for refugees to enter America. It didn't change his mind, but it did change his perspective.
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BBC Presenter
And that was Rajini Vajanathan. Russia and the United Kingdom have had strained relations recently. Outrage over the polonium murder of Alexander Litvinenko in London, sanctions over Russia's annexation of Crimea, not to mention tension over Russia's role in the wars in eastern Ukraine and Syria. And a report by our colleagues on Panorama last month alleging President Putin is corrupt did not help the BBC's popularity in Russia. So when our Moscow correspondent Steve Rosenberg traveled to to Siberia to report on the Russian economy, he felt a chill in the Air that wasn't just due to the winter temperature.
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Steve Rosenberg
When morning breaks over the River Ob, the commuter trains rumbling across the railway bridge disappear into clouds of mist. They are the ghost trains of a Siberian dawn. Through a pink and orange sky bursts a golden sun, and the Ob is bathed in light. But it's bitterly cold. The wind sweeps across the frozen river and chills to the bone. What could be colder than a Siberian winter? I'll tell you what the icy reception we're about to receive in Novosibirsk. We're out on the streets filming a report about the Russian economy. Suddenly I hear a voice. I'm from Novosibirsk Television. Are you the BBC? The reporter from this pro Kremlin channel has tracked us down, and his cameraman is already filming me. The journalist community of Novosibirsk wants to know why you're here. What kind of film are you making? He asks. He informs me that a recent BBC Panorama program on alleged Kremlin corruption was a pack of lies, a provocation. Are you making the same kind of film here? He barks. I tell the journalist, whose name is Alexander, that we're making a news report about life outside Moscow. Is that a problem? Yes, it is, he replies, judging by the kind of programs the BBC makes In the hotel that evening, I switch on the TV to see what kind of programs Siberian Television makes. Rather imaginative ones, judging by its main evening bulletin. BBC in Novosibirsk is headline news, but it's more fairy tale than fact. The newsreader introduces us incorrectly as the same BBC team that made that Panorama program about the Kremlin. Now they've received a new assignment straight from BBC headquarters, says the reporter, as if this is some kind of spy thriller. The reporter says that we've been filming things which we haven't. And at the end, the newsreader makes this announcement. Tune in tomorrow to find out what the BBC's report is really about. Next morning, we drive to a business center to interview the head of a local Internet company about Russia's recession and who should turn up uninvited. Yes, it's Alexander again with cameraman and questions. I want to know what kind of a report about Russia are you making? By now it's clear we're being followed. I tell Alexander it's very strange that we're being pursued. I haven't been following you, he replies. I just got a telephone call telling me where you are. I tell Alexander I don't think it's very polite to barge in to someone's private office, but we're doing the same job, he explains. You're making a report about Russia and so am I. We get onto the subject of Russia's economic crisis. Yes, but everyone's got economic problems now, haven't they? Says Alexander. There are problems in Britain, in America. Yes, I respond, but Russia's economy, much more than Britain's, is reliant on its energy exports. So when global oil prices fall, Russia is hit badly. That night, when I sit down to watch the local news, there we are again. In his news piece about us, Alexander declares sarcastically that the BBC knows how to show the pretty side of Russia, accusing us of filming food markets, bus stops and private houses. We may have plenty of dirt in our city, he says, but there's plenty of dirt in the west too. And in a bizarre attempt to prove his point, he he shows some photographs of dilapidated homes in the Essex seaside town of Jwick, officially the most deprived neighbourhood in England. The BBC would never show this, he declares. As relations between Russia and the west have deteriorated, the amount of anti Western reporting on pro Kremlin TV channels has risen. The Russian authorities too often complain about what they see as increasing anti Russian rhetoric in the Western media. Next day, out on Lenin Square, I interview some pensioners who are protesting against the government's economic policies. Suddenly, one woman says to me, hang on, I saw you on TV last night. You're that British journalist, aren't you? You're bad. Do you believe everything you see on pro Kremlin channels? I ask. You've come onto the streets to criticise your authorities, so why are you so ready to believe that the BBC is bad? Well, she replies, it's all right for us to criticise our government, but if we complain to you about our government, that's not patriotic.
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BBC Presenter
And that was Steve Rosenberg. The deep freeze in relations between the United States and Cuba has been thawing. The decades long economic blockade hasn't been lifted. But in December, President Barack Obama and his Cuban counterpart Raul Castro announced moves to normalize diplomatic relations. Commercial flights between the two countries will resume too. For the first time in 50 years from this autumn, American tourists and Cuban exiles will be able to take their pick from dozens of flights a day. But will there be room for all the welcoming committees at the airport here? Here's Will Grant.
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Will Grant
Raul is back in Cuba, ran the headline of the state run newspaper Gramma the other day. The story, if such an event can be called a story, was that on his arrival at Rosemarti International Airport, Raul Castro, back from a visit to France was received by Jose Ramon Machado Ventura, the second secretary of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party and vice president of the Council of State and Ministers. It might be considered impudent, but I couldn't help but wonder why the second secretary didn't have anything better to do with his time than greet the president off the plane from what was a pretty routine trip abroad. But that would be to misunderstand the crucial role of going to the airport in Cuban culture. It's a big thing here. Who's taking you when you leave? Who's there to pick you up when you return? Such questions can provoke minor family conflicts. On any given day you'll find the arrivals hall at Hosimati Airport heaving with expectant families, some complete with banners and balloons. Young children and grandparents gathered behind the security barrier strain their necks, hoping to glimpse their family members as they wait for their luggage off probably the slowest carousels in Latin America or evade the advances of overzealous customs officials. Then, finally, the long lost relative appears through the sliding doors, pushing a trolley piled high with suitcases and hard to come by electric electrical goods. Shrieks of delight briefly drown out the PA system as the prodigal rejoins the family's warm embrace to a cacophony of hugs, kisses and tears. So many Cuban families have been split up since the start of the revolution, divided into those who left and those who stayed. Sometimes the welcoming committee has turned out for a distant relative, a second cousin or a great aunt. In other cases, though, it's the the immediate family, husbands and wives or parents and children separated by Cold War era immigration policies. Gilberto fits into that latter category. A slender man with thick glasses and a crew cut, he is clutching his angelic 2 year old granddaughter, Leah, clad all in pink from the hair clips in her blonde ringlets down to her diminutive trainers. Ilberto explains that he's a doctor and is waiting for my son, her father, to arrive from Cancun. He seems young for a grandfather barely in his mid-50s, but he's bracing himself to say goodbye to his loved ones again. His son and daughter in law work in Mexico. He's a civil engineer and are coming back to pick up Leah and take her away with them. I'll be left alone in Havana, says Gilberto with a wry smile. That's what happens to us Cubans, some here, others over there. Recently, Havana's Jose Marti airport was the site of the healing of a different kind of family split a religious one in the Great Schism of 1054, the Eastern and Western branches of the Christian faith went their separate ways over the status of the pope in Rome, as well as a raft of other theological and ecclesiastical matters. Almost a thousand years had passed since this dispute cleft the church in two, and despite the best efforts by some previous pontiffs, no pope had ever met the Russian patriarch in all that time. Until, that is, they came to Havana's airport that the abiding image of global Christian unity, a fraternal embrace between Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill, was finally transmitted to the world from an airport in officially secular, even atheist Cuba. While the irony was not lost on many onlookers, what's more that the great schism be resolved in a 1970s relic of a VIP lounge in an airport that often lacks basics like coffee, lavatory paper and air conditioning only added to the sense of magical realism. But it wasn't the only news story out of Josie Marti Airport recently. Soon as many as 110 commercial flights a day could arrive in Cuba from The United States, 20 to Havana alone, raising the question of whether or not it can cope with the demand. Then President Obama announced that he, too, will be touching down on the tarmac in Havana in March, making the first US presidential visit to Cuba since Calvin Coolidge in 1928. The question is, of course, who's picking him up from the airport?
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BBC Presenter
Will Grant in Havana, and perhaps he'll be there himself when President Obama lands. That's it for today. We'll be back with more stories from our correspondents around the world on Thursday and Saturday next week. I do hope you'll join us then. Goodbye.